Less of a Bishop, more of a pope

Madonna King

The only woman in Tony Abbott's cabinet, Julie Bishop has impressed keen judges with her poise and competence as Australia's foreign minister - but could she one day be prime minister?

Julie Bishop, Australia's neat-as-a-pin and sharp-as-its-point foreign minister, has always been a stickler for time. As a new MP in Canberra, she timed the walk from her office to her House of Representatives seat: two minutes, 50 seconds. "There must be a quicker route," she penned in her 1998 diary.

"If you believed all the things written about you, you'd just pull the doona over your head": Julie Bishop. Photo: Jez Smith/Harper's Bazaar/AAP

Nothing's changed. Her watch is always set to West Australian time, perhaps to give her two extra hours at the end of each day. Time allowed for daily run: 45 minutes. Time permitted for post-jog cool-down, shower, dressing and make-up: 25 minutes. That pre-budget decision to change hairstyles: three seconds. Number of countries visited in past 12 months: 40. Time to waste: zero. "I've always been very busy," says Bishop, 58, who is also the Liberals' deputy leader. "There is so much to do, so much to achieve."

None of this surprises Leigh Whicker, who, in 1975, employed Bishop to pour beers in the bar of his hotel in Uraidla, in the Adelaide Hills, not far from the apple and cherry orchard where she grew up. An Adelaide University law student, Bishop would arrive for her shift, remove her textbooks from her bag and fan them out across one end of the bar. "She'd be doing an assignment between serving customers," says Whicker, a recently retired SA National Football League chief.

Grand entrance: Julie Bishop arrives at the Midwinter Ball at Parliament House in Canberra in June. Photo: Andrew Meares

Now, it seems, it's Bishop's time to shine, and she's repeatedly being mentioned in political speculation about who the next Liberal leader might be. "If Tony Abbott fell under a bus, who'd be leader?" asks a senior cabinet minister rhetorically. "There used to be only one name in that conversation: Joe Hockey. Then there were two: Joe, and Scott Morrison. Now there are three."

"She's been the outstanding success story of this government's first year," says federal Attorney-General George Brandis, Bishop's good friend. Defence Minister David Johnston, a Bishop cheerleader from the days when he ran the WA Liberal Party, labels her the best foreign minister he can remember. "She's well received in China, feted in Washington and loved in Jakarta. How could she be doing any better?"

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Another senior minister says Bishop has gone from being ignored to becoming a "serious contender", a move that's taken less than a year. Former Liberal federal treasurer Peter Costello, who has been Bishop's mentor since they met at the 1998 Constitutional Convention, agrees that she hasn't put a foot wrong.

Of course, at this point, there is no race: no one is counting numbers and Abbott's leadership, internally, is strong. Other factors count in a ballot for the top gig, too, such as where state candidates hail from and their factional alliances. Bishop, who represents the WA seat of Curtin, has a handicap on both of these fronts, but she's been amassing a strong body of support on the backbench, criss-crossing the country to assist marginal seat MPs and lobbying for those she considers talented to be given additional parliamentary roles. "Julie is a rock star when it comes to Liberal-National supporters because she motivates our base," says Queensland Liberal Senator James McGrath. "In the lead-up to the election last year, Julie - despite living in WA - did more in Queensland, in marginal seats, than anyone else."

All together then: Julie Bishop as a child in the late 1950s, being held by her father, Douglas. Her mother has her hands on sister MaryLou, while sister Patricia stands in front of her grandparents Hilda and William. Photo: courtesy of Julie Bishop

The fact that Bishop - who, in opposition, transferred to foreign affairs from treasury after a series of political missteps - is now front and centre is testament to her strong performance on the international stage. She's had to deal with the horror of one aircraft vanishing without trace, another shot down in seconds, and a sickening war beamed into our lounge rooms where beheadings have become the weapon du jour. But who is the woman inside the Armani suits, the woman behind that famous stare?

Julie Isabel Bishop was born in july 1956, the third of four children to Douglas and Isabel. The family's home was an apple and cherry orchard at Basket Range in the Adelaide Hills; Julie shared a bedroom with MaryLou, four years her senior, and Patricia, one year older (a brother, Douglas, arrived six years later). In answer to claims that her background was a privileged one, Bishop talks about the Black Sunday bushfires that raged through the Adelaide Hills the year before she was born, taking the Bishops' orchard, and livelihood, with them. "My childhood was spent in the shadow of the impact of the devastation," she says. "[The orchard] didn't turn a profit until the 1970s." The family lived frugally, on an inheritance and family savings, with the children attending the local Basket Range Primary School. Later, the three sisters went to Adelaide's exclusive St Peter's Collegiate Girls' School.

By school age, Bishop was already showing a penchant for neatness and an organisational fastidiousness that would come to characterise her later career. "She was always full of energy, always loved being part of a team, organising people," says Patricia. "And she was always happy to be leader if that was the role given to her." She was also a tomboy. "She used to sit on Daddy's knee and share his beer," continues Patricia. "She used to watch the footy, too. She's always been mad on footy."

And while that stare - "We'd always say, 'If looks could kill', because Julie could always throw you one of those looks" - may still have been a work in progress, her siblings knew when Julie wasn't happy. During the sisters' frequent stagings of Robin Hood, Patricia always bagged the lead role, while MaryLou claimed the part of Maid Marian. Julie, somewhat unimaginably, was left with Friar Tuck. "She was perfectly happy wearing the hessian bag until she realised he was the fat, unattractive one," Patricia laughs. "Then she spat the dummy."

Legal eagle: In 1982, as a partner of law firm Mangan, Ey & Bishop. Photo: courtesy of Julie Bishop

Bishop's fashion sense kicked in early after her mother presented her one day with a home-sewn tunic covered in go-karts. "She hated it," says MaryLou. "Ever since then, it's been, 'This is what I'm wearing.' " Outfits reminiscent of a gun-toting Annie Oakley featured in her early wardrobe before blue jeans and stylish cardigans won out. But, as soon as she could afford it, these in turn were binned in favour of Giorgio Armani, pearls and killer heels. "I've always loved clothes and I've always read fashion magazines ever since I was a little girl," Bishop says. "It's part of who I am."

When the local Anglican priest retired, leaving students at Basket Range Primary School without a religious-instruction tutor, 10-year-old Bishop decided she would take over. A few years later, she was representing Douglas and Isabel at parent-teacher interviews for her little brother, coming home and reprimanding him if she thought he could do better. And at 13, over the din of protests against the Vietnam War, she captained a school debating team to victory, arguing that demonstrations were a waste of time. "If I have something to say, I won't be wasting my time demonstrating on the steps of Parliament. I'll make sure my voice is heard inside Parliament," she said.

On the world stage: Bishop with, from left, US Secretary of Defence Chuck Hagel, Australian Defence Minister David Johnston, US Secretary of State John Kerry and Governor-General Peter Cosgrove in Sydney in August. Photo: Getty Images

It was then that the idea of being a lawyer - representing people, debating and winning - struck her. (Interestingly, it is politics, not law, that threads through Bishop's family tree: her grandfather, William James Bishop, and his daughter-in-law - Bishop's mother Isabel - served as conservative mayors on East Torrens District Council. Her father, Doug, was deeply involved in agri-politics, while MaryLou has just been elected to local government in South Australia.)

Still, "Julie was no Goody Two-Shoes," Patricia says. Indeed, the family was surprised when Julie was named head prefect because, despite being clever, she wasn't top of the class. Isabel Bishop visited her daughter's headmistress, Elizabeth Pike, to query the appointment. "We knew that if we didn't have her with us," Pike told her mother, "she'd be against us." Adds Patricia: "They had to have Julie on side to get all the year 12 girls on side because they knew she was a natural leader."

Bishop speaking at the United Nations in New York in September. Photo: Reuters

With her heart set on law, Julie studied at the University of Adelaide, travelling between home, university and two part-time jobs as a barmaid in an orange 1964 Austin-Healey Sprite she and Patricia had bought. "These were the days of miniskirts," says Patricia. "If we didn't get a whistle from the blokes we'd wonder what we'd done wrong." After graduating in 1978, Bishop ensconced herself in Adelaide's legal scene: she was the first female articled clerk at an established law firm (her decision to leave the same year was prompted by a senior partner handing her a drinks' tray one night and suggesting she offer around its contents) and, at just 26, had become a partner at the law firm Mangan, Ey & Bishop.

While Bishop was never hard-up for boyfriends, it was a dashing builder from WA, Neil Gillon, whose family boasted a big property portfolio, who stole her heart. "She was a bit restless, looking for a bit of adventure," Patricia says, "and along comes this handsome, romantic man who sent her a dozen carnations once a week until she accepted his proposal."

In 1983, Bishop moved to Perth to marry Gillon but, only five years later, the marriage was over. He was based in Rome, where he managed Alan Bond's properties, forcing an unfeasible commute on his new wife. Bishop prefers not to dwell on this chapter of her life, its impact perhaps more uncomfortable than she lets on. "Our mother was very old-fashioned," says MaryLou. "You marry for life. It would have been very hard for Julie to say, 'This hasn't worked out.' " The 1988 divorce, adds Patricia, was as inevitable as it was traumatic: "Their lives became so separate almost immediately." Other friends comment that perhaps Bishop, who'd changed her name to Julie Gillon, fell too hard too fast, quickly papering over the couple's different backgrounds and lifestyles: "He really loved the high life and hung around a glamorous crowd and I think Julie wanted a life with more meaning," says one.

If Julie struggled personally when her marriage collapsed, she had to dig even deeper to win a ticket to Canberra. Career triumphs in Perth quickly mirrored the success she'd had in Adelaide; by the time she was 30, she was one of Perth's most impressive litigators with a "take-no-prisoners" approach that got her noticed. She represented mining and industrial giant CSR, which opposed compensation claims from some workers who were dying of asbestos-related illnesses. (Bishop has been targeted by Labor on this point, but has consistently denied the claim, saying she acted ethically and professionally in accordance with client instructions.) She also acted for Burswood Casino and its founder, Dallas Dempster, in the 1990-92 "WA Inc" royal commission, a long-reaching political scandal that prompted her, ultimately, to sign up with the Liberal Party. "I thought WA deserved a lot better than we had received from Labor governments," she says.

The move to active Liberal membership had been building since childhood: her grandfather politician, William James Bishop, and former South Australian conservative premier, Thomas Playford, were good buddies, while Alexander Downer's family - long associated with the SA Liberals - lived nearby. At home, Doug and Isabel always credited the Liberals with a focus on family, good economic management and enterprise.

Bishop slipped into Perth's well-to-do set perfectly, her prodigious work ethic offset by a liking for parties, champagne and a good laugh. Her friendship circle was filled with other up-and-coming, ambitious young women who weren't afraid to challenge Perth's powerful business cliques. Female business mentors were rare, so the young women formed their own support network. Bishop's self-discipline, even then, was legendary. "Julie wants to be fit," says friend and Perth businesswoman Valerie Davies. "She doesn't put anything in her mouth if it's going to make her overweight."

By her 38th birthday, Bishop was managing partner of Clayton Utz (formerly Robinson Cox), but was about to home in on another challenge that would see her become MP for Curtin four years later, in 1998. To do that, she had to beat the then-PM John Howard's preferred candidate, Allan Rocher, who had held the seat since 1981, the last two years as an independent.

Two years earlier, in 1996, Bishop had undertaken a short advanced management course at Harvard Business School where she attended a lecture given by Professor George Cabot Lodge. He asked Bishop and her peers a pointed question: how many of them would give back to the community through public service? Bishop glanced around the class; every American had raised their hand. Hers shot up, too. "I'm not sure why I put my hand up, but I did," she says.

In 1998, she was invited to be a delegate at the Constitutional Convention, where she met Peter Costello. "She showed an independence of mind [and a] willingness to think about the issues and come up with her own view, rather than just toe what would be the convenient line," he says. Both Costello and then-foreign minister, Alexander Downer, went against the wishes of Howard and campaigned actively for Bishop to beat the Howard-backed Rocher in the contest for Curtin. "Howard wouldn't support her, so I made a big point of going across to WA and [doing just that]," Costello says. To this day, he remembers how he described her at her campaign launch: "Not just a bishop - certainly a cardinal. Perhaps even a pope."

Bishop and Howard exchanged strong words over his decision to back Rocher, but she won't talk about it now, saying simply, "It's ancient history." Howard is more forthcoming: "For a long time, it looked as though [Rocher] would be readmitted [into the Liberal Party] and would be endorsed for the 1998 election," he says. "That didn't happen. It's not true to say I campaigned against Julie: I had nothing against her. It's just that I had a close association with Allan."

Bishop's campaign was home-grown, neat and precise, her friends organising their own focus group over lunch one day and all pitching in to make signs. Julie Bishop, the best-dressed candidate the voters of Curtin had ever seen, embarked on a charm offensive. She won the seat easily in the October 1998 federal poll, then took her place in Canberra.

She almost left again to return to WA to take over the leadership of the state opposition after Richard Court lost the 2001 WA election. The state party voted to accept her as leader, but the proposal was ridiculed widely. "I advised her against it," says Howard. "She rang me about it and I said I thought leading a political party was much, much harder than most people thought." Bishop backed out, but not before some of her Canberra peers chalked up the episode as a significant lapse of political judgement.

Howard handed Bishop the ministry of ageing in 2003, which she handled well, and a short stint as education minister also brought broad praise. It was while in opposition, after the 2007 federal election that brought Kevin Rudd and Labor to power, that she stumbled badly. Bishop was elected deputy leader of the Liberal Party under Brendan Nelson and, one year later, under Malcolm Turnbull's leadership, she added shadow treasurer to her job title.

She faltered quickly on several fronts: forgetting the Reserve Bank cash interest rate in an early interview; facing two accusations of plagiarism (in one, she used tracts of a Wall Street Journal article in a speech to parliament without attribution); and failing, in the eyes of many in the party, to land a punch on then-treasurer Wayne Swan. Four months after accepting the post of shadow treasurer, she quit, but retained the deputy leadership. "She had a rough time in Treasury," Howard says. "From her point of view, and from everybody's point of view, it was good when she moved out of that."

"I know she had a rocky road," says Peter Costello, "but it was a very bad time. There were a lot of ambitious men who wanted her job, so there was a lot of briefing against her."

It was a crushing political climb-down but Bishop had her eye on another prize: foreign affairs. As a young lawyer, she'd sought the counsel of the 28-year-old Downer - then a bureaucrat in the department of foreign affairs - and consumed Henry Kissinger's Diplomacy. In opposition, she pooled her travel allowance with other entitlements to travel overseas to conferences where she sat at the back, an unnoticed observer.

Observers, academics and supporters all agree: Julie Bishop will always be better in government than in opposition. "She's a problem solver," offers Professor Greg Craven, a constitutional law expert and Australian Catholic University vice chancellor, by way of explanation. "The whole point about opposition is you are not meant to solve problems: you're meant to make them worse."

Elections are rarely fought on foreign affairs, and last year's federal poll was no exception. Bishop had time to focus on the minutiae of her portfolio while supporting those candidates fighting to win marginal seats. When Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 vanished from the skies in March, she sounded unflappable and authoritative, but was also quick to capitalise on the opportunity the joint search efforts provided to further cement Australia's relationship with China. Then, when the seemingly impossible happened and Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 was shot down over Ukraine in July, she excelled in her expression of all the emotions the rest of us were feeling. Dread. Fear. White fury. Unspeakable sadness. At home, she was lead comforter; abroad, a prosecutor, demanding action over the homicidal assault.

Bishop had been at her own birthday party at MaryLou's home in Adelaide only a couple of hours earlier. Arriving late as a result of negotiations with Clive Palmer, her speech - about the importance of always staying connected to family and close friends - was short. She enjoyed a glass of champagne and retired to bed. A few hours later, at 3am, a text message sounded on Bishop's mobile phone signalling the downing of a Malaysian passenger airliner with 298 people on board. "Not in my worst dreams did I imagine I would be told another Malaysian Airlines plane had been involved in a tragedy and that all crew and passengers were dead, including dozens of Australians," she says. "I got straight out of bed. I knew there was work to do."

In the weeks that followed, Bishop was thrust centre stage. Voters have since made it clear: they like what they've seen of the woman inside the Armani armour. "The sad thing - and it's clearly not confined to Julie, it applies to both sides of the political spectrum - is that we don't really get to know our leaders any more because they do have to be so guarded," says her brother, Douglas. "Julie is actually very emotional."

When asked whether the public might have previously viewed her as a little brittle, Bishop waves her hand dismissively. "You've got to be kidding," she says. "Politics is a very public occupation and we have our guards in place. If you believed all the things written about you, you'd just pull the doona over your head." Thinking about Australian troops overseas makes it hard to sleep some nights, she admits. "The [Special Air Service Regiment] are based in my electorate," she says. "I know them. I know their families. I know their children. I know where they live. I know how their wives feel."

She doesn't have time for regrets, either: children were in her life plan, but they just didn't happen. "It is what it is," she says. Notes Patricia: "I'm sure she would have been a wonderful mother but she threw herself into her career and, before she knew it, she was 40 and without a partner." Adds MaryLou: "The fact she didn't have a husband and children meant she had time to do all these things. You don't look back." Bishop never remarried after her 1988 divorce but has had other long-term partners, including controversial former Liberal senator Ross Lightfoot, former Perth lord mayor Peter Nattrass and, most recently, property developer David Panton, with whom she was photographed at this year's Melbourne Cup.

"She's tough," says Senator McGrath. "Iron-ore tough." He points to how she homed in on Russian Ambassador to the UN Vitaly Churkin in July, almost reducing him to tears by showing him pictures of Perth siblings Mo, Evie and Otis Maslin and their grandfather, Nick Norris, who died on MH17. Adds John Poynton, who's been friends with Bishop since she married his best mate Neil Gillon in 1983: "I hesitate to use the analogy because it's not one everybody would endorse, but there's a Margaret Thatcher inside Julie. She knows what she believes in, she's prepared to advocate very strongly for what she believes in, and might not necessarily care too much about what other people think."

Since late 2012, Bishop has cared a whole lot less about what people think, a shift that has even pervaded her appearance. "She looks more carefree," says Poynton, "a bit less twin-set-and-pearls. There's now a bit of edginess to her, a bit of boldness." Her new, no-nonsense haircut has doubtlessly helped: in place of the shiny Diana "wings", there's a shorter, straighter crop, one that caused pundits to joke that her hairdressing allowance had been axed in May's federal budget.

On the day of our interview, she delights in the sudden flightiness of her young female staff, who are having their photographs taken with Australian actor Chris Hemsworth. Bishop met the Thor star at the 2014 AFL grand final and invited him to come to Parliament House to talk to the PM about the Australian Childhood Foundation, for which he and his brother Liam, also an actor, are ambassadors.

George Brandis believes the impetus for Bishop's new-found poise occurred in late 2012, when the Liberal leadership was nutting out how to attack Julia Gillard over her alleged involvement in Australian Workers' Union slush funds. The attacker needed authority, a keen legal mind and the ability to drill down into the minutiae of the allegations. The job was handed to Bishop, who revelled in the task. "Julie's prosecution of Julia Gillard was a breakthrough moment in the minds of colleagues because she demonstrated herself to be one hell of a politician," Brandis says. "The way she handled the MH17 affair, particularly at the UN Security Council, was a breakthrough moment for her in the eyes of the public."

So what next for Bishop, whose closest confidants remain her three siblings? "If the Liberal Party wanted her to be PM, she would make a brilliant PM," says Patricia, with sisterly fealty, "but she's not the sort to carry a knife in her backpack. She believes the duty of the deputy is to support the leader." It's not even on her radar, agrees MaryLou. "She said to me, 'Why would I want to be dealing with [Palmer United Party MPs] Jacqui Lambie and Clive Palmer when I can be on the world stage talking to the most fascinating people in the world? Why would I want to be prime minister?' "

Bishop hasn't timed the walk from her ministerial office to the House of Representatives. After 16 years, she knows the quickest route and at what pace she must travel to get there. For the record, it takes 75 seconds, five fewer than the same trip from the PM's office.